


Mercy Me

by GhostoftheMotif



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: 20th Century, Battlefield, Developing Relationship, Friendship, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-03
Updated: 2011-10-03
Packaged: 2017-10-24 07:07:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,943
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/260490
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GhostoftheMotif/pseuds/GhostoftheMotif
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There had been a moment when Canada could have taken the shot, but he didn't.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mercy Me

**Author's Note:**

  * For [diaage](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=diaage).



The first and only time that Canada saw Prussia on the battlefield, the other nation was retreating. Canada, America, England, and Poland were slowly forming a wall against the German troops, cutting them off and locking them in a formation. Prussia and a small contingent of soldiers found a way out between Canada and Poland’s lines, and he pushed through. There had been a moment when Canada could have taken the shot ( _rifle heavy and cold in his arms, pressed against the dip beside his shoulder, Prussia’s chest in the crosshairs, the thrum of explosions in the ground beneath him, air thick with shouts and screams_ ), but his hands shook and hesitated. He could hear France’s voice in his head, could remember stories of this man told to him in his childhood, and more than that… Prussia hadn’t seen him yet through the swathe of gunfire and blood.  
   
From appearance alone, it would have been difficult to recognize Prussia in the surge of bodies. He was wearing the same uniform as the men around him, and his helmet covered the impossibly white hair and shadowed the legendary red eyes. None of this mattered in the face of the indefinable quality that made a nation known to his own kind, but even if that hadn’t been the case, Canada’s attention would have been drawn to him anyway. Prussia was retreating, but he wasn’t running. He wasn’t attending to the enemy soldiers shooting to kill in front of him or falling in with the troops making their desperate bid for escape; Prussia was constantly looking over his shoulder at his own men, guarding them, doing everything in his power to them through the clash with their lives, shouting an unending barrage of commands. The other nation seemed… invincible, untouchable in the fray.  
   
Then, with Canada’s finger curling over the trigger as he struggled with himself, Prussia’s stare slid to the side and found the blue eyes focused on him so intently.  
   
A beat of impossible stillness crept over them, made the surrounding battle appear to slow.  
   
Prussia flashed him something between a crooked grin and a sneer, and the moment passed, and Canada didn’t shoot.  
   
\---  
   
The first and only time Canada saw Prussia after the war and before the wall was built, he was being monitored as he said goodbye to his brother.  
   
It made Canada go cold, and for several hours after, he couldn’t stop seeing Prussia’s forced expression of strength, nonchalance, and comfort or Germany’s desperation and haunted loss trying to mask itself in stone. He wondered what it would be like having to say goodbye to America and couldn’t answer England when he asked if he was all right during the ride to the airport.  
   
His mind was still stuck on two brothers standing in the corner of a room, bathed in light from an open window, whispering personal, private vows to one another in front of an audience.  
   
\---  
   
He never saw Prussia while the Berlin Wall separated East and West, but he saw a photograph of him nearly every day for the span of three months.  
   
The photograph was on France’s desk, right beside one of France, England, America, and Canada from France’s birthday several years previous. In it, Prussia was sitting on a wooden fence, hands on the beam beneath him, leaning forward slightly, Spain standing a little ways from him. Both were smiling, but there was something so… _peaceful_ , so _comfortable_ about it. These were friends, these were two people happy for the trees behind them, happy for the blue sky, happy to be staring out at the pasture in front of them. There was a softness to Prussia’s expression that Canada hadn’t seen from him before.  
   
Canada knew the photograph had to have been taken after the wall had been built, but he never asked France about the circumstances surrounding it.  
   
\---  
   
The third time Canada saw Prussia in 1990, he knew he wasn’t looking at Prussia the Soldier or Prussia the Brother or Prussia the Friend. He was looking at Prussia the Changed. The purple beneath his eyes and the slight hollowing of his cheeks meant nothing; when he passed Canada in the hall, he flashed him the same grin-sneer-hybrid he’d given in the 1940’s with shells falling around him and the air hissing with bullets. The difference was that now Canada caught an undercurrent, acknowledgement rather than arrogant dismissal.  
   
“Good morning, Prussia,” Canada managed after only a small faltering of steps.  
   
The older nation’s smile quirked a little more as he replied with, “Yeah. Hey, kid.”  
   
Mere seconds later, he was a good distance away, and Canada wondered at how strange it felt to talk to someone for the first time in half a century.  
   
\---  
   
The first time Canada was alone with Prussia for any length of time, they were in England’s study, and they could only be considered alone if one didn’t count the drunk, passed out Spain being supported on Prussia’s shoulder.  
   
Prussia heaved his friend into the plush chair behind England’s desk and straightened, cricking his neck. “God _damn_ he’s gained some weight. Next time we go to a house party, I’m gonna insist he bring a cart for me to tote him around in if he’s planning on pulling this shit.”  
   
“That sounds… reasonable,” Canada answered a little uncertainly.  
   
“Canada, right? What are you doing up here, anyway?” Prussia redirected, observing him the way one might an oddity behind cage bars. “Party’s downstairs.” He seemed to think about that sentence and scowled as he shoved his hands in his pockets. “In a non-pun way, because those jokes are getting really old, and if Turkey or Denmark makes one more tonight, I’m going to punch them in the teeth, I swear to God.”  
   
“Oh, err…” Canada lifted the book in his hands in a weak attempt at an explanation; the cover knocked against his wrist awkwardly. “I got bored, and England has a lot of good books up here, so…”  
   
Prussia blinked, incredulous. “You’re reading. At a party. Now I know why I don’t know you any better.” He gave a bark of laughter that made the line of his shoulders stand out. “I _thought_ it was weird that there’d be a hot blonde wandering around that I hadn’t gotten acquainted with yet. For one of France’s kids, you ain’t got much of his flare.”  
   
Blushing and deciding to pretend he hadn’t been called hot, Canada was quick to come to his own defense, “I got tired of sitting on a couch and having my brother shout in my ear because…” he adopted his best ‘America voice’. “ _Hey, Canada! Did you hear what Hungary said? Pretty funny, huh?_ And then he repeats whatever it was even if I say I did hear.” Canada ducked his head down, fidgeting with a page of his book. “And Poland was half-sitting on me anyway…”  
   
“You should dance.”  
   
The look of horrified disagreement on Canada’s face must have been answer enough.  
   
Prussia laughed, and Canada realized he had many different versions of the sound. This one was good-natured and daring, not at all like the cruel, rough one Canada had heard on occasion in the past. “You just gotta decide what’s better… drunken nations shouting and using you as pillow or drunken nations feeling you up.”  
   
“I like the couch best,” Canada replied wryly. Then he remembered who he was talking to, dropped his eyes again, and tried to stop his pulse from splitting his veins. Calm, calm, _calm…_  
   
“Aw, hey, I’ll make a nice buffer for you.” Then Prussia did the _exact right thing_ that could have made Canada curl up in a ball of nervous, blushing disbelief. He winked and held out a hand. “Whadaya say?”  
   
Canada didn’t say anything unless a barely-audible squeak could be allotted as a response. Prussia took it as an agreement anyway.  
   
The first time Canada danced with Prussia, the older nation was at a comparatively respectable distance behind him, one guiding hand on his waist, palm and fingers warm as they curled over his side while his thumb fit in the groove of his ribs.  
   
In the soft lull in between songs, Prussia leaned forward and whispered, lips brushing his ear, “I remember you. You could have shot me, kid.”  
   
Canada went still, cold.  
   
Prussia’s hand moved further across until his arm was around him, pulled him against his chest, and kissed the younger nation’s neck. “Thanks.”  
   
The moment was so short it would have been utterly forgettable if not for the content. Prussia relinquished his hold, and his hand went back to the light grip on Canada’s waist as if nothing had happened.  
   
\---  
   
The first time Prussia thought _hey, maybe there’s something here_ , France and Spain were walking a little ways ahead of them, belting out a song at the top of their lungs, and Canada was at his side, determinedly gripping France’s car keys in his hand as they made their way down the sidewalk.  
   
He’d thought about Canada quite often over the last six decades. Whether it was just after falling asleep and the dream bled into something else or if it dug into his lungs and yanked him awake, the image of what the other nation had looked like on the slope of a hill, beneath the trees in the white of snow, aiming to kill… it would not leave him. Prussia remembered believing beyond any doubt that he was about to shot and that even if it didn’t kill him, he would be captured. This man lifting a rifle at him was another nation, and there was no feasible reason for him not to pull the trigger. He’d sneered up at him, waited for it… but it never came. Inexplicably, he’d been spared, shown mercy from this nation whose name he wasn’t even sure of.  
   
Years later, Russia had arranged for him to get out of Berlin for a while. He’d met France and Spain at a rundown house that Prussia had once lived in a long time ago, before the world wars. They’d sat out on the fence around the property and talked. It hadn’t taken long for Prussia to bring up the nation who had failed to take his life, to confess the image that wouldn’t leave him alone.  
   
( _“Canada…” France had answered him with a soft smile, and Prussia had turned the name over on his tongue._ )  
   
France spent a large portion of that afternoon telling Prussia stories about the boy growing up, and it was… it was _good_ , because Prussia and France hadn’t been able to speak to each other with that civility and warmth in such a long time, and it was a step, a _huge_ step towards rebuilding the relationship between them that had been so brutally damaged. Prussia listened while France spoke of his little brother, learned about this nation he couldn’t remember ever having spoken to, and felt Spain’s hand weigh down on his as if to say _yes, this can be mended._  
   
On the drive back to Berlin, Prussia had thought that if there was any poetic justice in the world, a man like Canada would have been the one to kill him. But Canada had let him live, and he’d have to decide what that meant.  
   
Now, with their shoulders brushing as they walked, Prussia couldn’t help but to let his hand catch on the one that hadn’t pulled the trigger, couldn’t help but coil their fingers together, couldn’t help but smile when he caught the blush and bow of the head from the corner of his eyes.

   
 _Yeah…_ he thought. _Maybe there’s something here._


End file.
